


Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy

by flootzavut



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Blanket Permission, First Kiss, Fluff, GNU Terry Pratchett, I'm not sorry, M/M, Schmoop, inexperienced entities, queer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-17
Updated: 2019-06-17
Packaged: 2020-05-13 19:34:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,001
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19257769
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flootzavut/pseuds/flootzavut
Summary: After the apocalypse that wasn't, Aziraphale is emboldened.Warning: contains schmoop.





	Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy

**Author's Note:**

  * For [alleyesonthehindenburg](https://archiveofourown.org/users/alleyesonthehindenburg/gifts).



> for general awesomeness and also coming up with a perfect title less than a minute after I asked for help 🙌🏼🙌🏼🙌🏼
> 
> This was inspired by the TV series, but I've been rereading the book for almost thirty years, so inevitably, it draws on the book canon; it's all just one big melange of GO in my brain, and attempting to write pure TV or pure book canon is probably never gonna happen ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ 😹
> 
> Thanks also to [La_Temperanza](https://archiveofourown.org/users/La_Temperanza/profile) for creating a "how to" about AO3 footnotes even a twit like me could manage.

* * *

_**Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy** _

* * *

 

Aziraphale's hand at the small of Crowley's back isn't unusual. People (or at least, people-shaped entities) don't spend millennia together without taking certain intimacies for granted.

Aziraphale's hand lingering there _is_ unusual, and unexpected; enough to make Crowley glance at him sidelong, but not enough to distract attention from the glass of rather fine brandy[1] Crowley is currently nursing.

Aziraphale slipping said hand tentatively further up Crowley's back, in a way that makes Crowley bite his tongue on a gasp, is... extraordinary.

"Angel?" Crowley asks, after a very long pause. (If anyone should ask, the word is purely descriptive; it's nothing, it's no more tender or meaningful than calling a human, well, 'Human'.[2]

"Yes, Crowley?"

"What are you doing?"

Aziraphale laughs softly. "Dear boy, what on Earth makes you think that I have a single clue what I'm doing?"

Crowley blinks, looks sideways at Aziraphale, who's even paler than usual, eyes wide. As Crowley watches, Aziraphale swallows hard and worries at his lip with his teeth. Crowley stifles the urge to reach up and stop him. "I beg your pardon?"

Aziraphale smiles, a tentative, uncertain smile. "I have no idea what I'm doing. None whatsoever. I just know that I can't _not_ do it anymore."

"Oh."

"Is that... is that a problem?"

"No. No, not a problem." The nonchalance Crowley wears like armour has suddenly faded from polished steel to something more like a gossamer veil. He doesn't know what to do. And he always knows what to do when it comes to Aziraphale. Aziraphale is unchanging and unsurprising, the one constant for sixty centuries, and this is...

Crowley doesn't know what this is.

Aziraphale studies him for a moment longer, as if he's double checking something, then relaxes a little. "Good."

Crowley can't seem to look away.

"Now, my dear-" (Aziraphale's always calling him that, it doesn't mean anything. It can't mean anything.) "-facing the end of one's life - especially when one is technically immortal and as such never really expected that life to end - has a wonderful way of concentrating the mind."

"Yes?"

"And well, you see, for a very long time I convinced myself that nothing could ever come of it. That even if I wanted to- wanted, you didn't. And even if you did, it would never fly with head office."

"Mmhm?" Crowley's heart is hammering in his chest, an all too human reaction he can't seem to suppress.

"But now... now I don't believe I care what head office would say. Or that it might be very stupid. Because even for an angel, it seems, life can be so very short. Much too short not to tell the people in one's life how much one cares for them." His voice gets softer and his cheeks turn pink. "I suppose what I'm saying is... Crowley, I do care for you, so very, very much."

A dozen flippant responses occur to Crowley, along with one or two that would be very cruel and one that is achingly saccharine. "Oh," is what he eventually manages. "Thank you." He gulps. His mouth has gone dry. "I, um, I care about you, too," he finishes at last, his confession even quieter than Aziraphale's.

They're facing each other now; it's automatic to turn towards Aziraphale, like a blessed sunflower, Crowley can't help it. Aziraphale's hand is warm and inexorable, tugging him gently closer, annihilating their already minimalist private bubbles, so close, _so close_. It's tempting to ask Aziraphale what he's doing, but he's already said he doesn't know. Besides, every potential answer is terrifying, and Crowley would rather not have time to panic.

"Crowley," Aziraphale says, watching him, touching his arm, his shoulder... his _face_.

Aziraphale's fingers on his cheek - it's not enough and too much, and Crowley can't help himself, he leans into it the smallest amount. If they were human, it would be imperceptible, but Aziraphale smiles shyly.

"Dear boy," he says, in the softest whisper, then he's carefully cupping Crowley's jaw in his hand, the other on the small of Crowley's back again, drawing him in, and his gaze flicks to Crowley's mouth for a second before he tilts his head up, and Crowley's never done this before but he recognises the scenario, has seen plenty of movies, and he knows what's coming as surely as if it were prophesied. He's terrified. This can't really be happening. Even if he wanted to move away, he couldn't. He's frozen in place with shock and confusion.

But he doesn't want to move.

The first brush of lips is awkward - there are too many noses involved, and Aziraphale was just being honest about not knowing what he's doing. Neither of them can seem to figure out how their mouths are supposed fit together, teeth are a clear and present danger, and Crowley isn't sure what (if anything) he should be doing with his tongue. How do humans manage this?

Quite frankly, it's a disaster. (Crowley wants to do it again immediately.)

Aziraphale takes a moment longer than Crowley to open his eyes, and it gives Crowley a second to just _look_ , to look at his- his best friend, his ally, his _person_ for six thousand years. His angel. "Aziraphale?"

"Yes?"

Crowley doesn't know what to ask or say.

Aziraphale finally opens his eyes, and looks up. "I've wanted to do that for a very long time." His lips are tugging up at the corners; Crowley has the ridiculous, almost painfully human urge to kiss his smile.

"I, uh." _Can we do it again?_ Crowley's not used to being speechless. "It was-" Wonderful, terrible, confusing, amazing.

"I'm not sure how that was supposed to go," Aziraphale admits, rather sheepishly. "I _really_ don't know what I'm doing."

Crowley shrugs a shoulder. "We could... we could practise," he suggests, trying (and probably failing) to sound casual.

Aziraphale's smile widens. "We could?"

"We should." Crowley grins. This being on their own side thing might work out rather well.[3]

_~ fin ~_

**Author's Note:**

> [1] No one is more surprised at the quality than the brandy itself, which was decidedly mediocre in the bottle. [return to text]
> 
> [2] These are the little lies Crowley tells himself in order to stay more or less on the right side of sanity. [return to text]
> 
> [3] And as it turns out (at least for angels and demons), practice really does make perfect. [return to text]


End file.
